Crazy real estate video from Raleigh: line of cars with people to see house priced under $300K

[mnhtnbb]

With one Facebook posting, Realtor Monique Edwards illustrated Raleigh’s affordable housing problem in jaw-dropping detail. A line of cars stretching for a block in two directions and dozens of people waiting for a look at a rare opportunity: a house priced under $300,000. “When we say there is a housing crisis, we really mean it,” said Edwards, the owner/broker at NC Living Realty, panning her phone camera over the crowd in the post. “It’s absolutely insane.”

And when the clock had scarcely struck 5 p.m. Tuesday, they arrived at the house on Lafferty Court — 1,485 square feet listed for $260,000.

Raleigh has grown accustomed to houses that size with half-million-dollar price tags close to downtown, but Edwards stressed the scarcity of homes for middle-income families across the region. Wake County’s median home price recently hit $400,000, and Raleigh qualifies as the third-hottest real estate market in the country, according to Zillow.

The Zillow listing on the home Edwards’ client looked at shows three bedrooms and three bathrooms for the two-story house, which sits on a quarter-acre lot inside a cul-de-sac.


Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article258677088.html#storylink=cpy


Click the link to see the video. It's wild.

On edit: see the house on Zillow: https://www.zillow.com/homes/4509-Lafferty-Ct-Raleigh,-NC-27616_rb/6502934_zpid/

[sinkingfeeling]

1. Close to where I had a split-level in 1979. Paid $68,0000 for it.

[dsc]

2. well it is an amazing deal barring it being a fixer upper

I am buying in a much less hot market (Greene County NC) and my 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath, new house will be 192,400.

[Samrob]

3. I receive anywhere from 3 to 8 offers to buy my condo every week. And I am not even selling.

Cash offers for twice what I would ask for. Realtors calling every day. I have updated nothing in here since moving in 16 years ago. 2B 2Bath 1270 sq ft. Go figure.

[underpants]

4. Not that bad but reminds me of apartments in the 90's

I should have jumped in one - started filling out the application while everyone was looking around. Stupid decision by me. Wasn’t sure the check would clear at the time.

[Solly Mack]

5. We've been offered twice what we paid a few years ago.

Even in this rural area.

[mnhtnbb]

6. I'm not surprised.

Zillow says my house is worth $170K--almost 35%--more than what I paid when I signed the contract to build my house in April 2020, which was completed in Dec 2020. I think Zillow is over the top, but I wouldn't be surprised if it were in the $125-150K more range.

[MineralMan]

8. For many people, your $170K house will seem like a fantasy.

These days, people everywhere seem to think home prices everywhere are skyrocketing. That's true, but not everywhere. A $170K house is a rare thing in many markets. If people really understood that, there would be lots of people cashing in on their outrageously priced homes and moving to places like the one where you live. If someone lived in California, for example, sold their home for the going price out there and moved to where you are, they'd have a tidy nest egg to help with their retirement.

Most people, though, can't see that. They think they must live where they live and cannot imagine moving.

[Johnny2X2X]

10. We are undergoing a great change

Work from Home is here to stay, especially for tech workers. You're about to see a ton of people move away from expensive parts of the country to cheaper places because they can keep their jobs while working from home. It's already happening.

The effect of this will be to raise prices in traditionally cheaper towns and lower prices in expensive cities.

And there is now wage competition between different regions because of work from home. I'm very happy with my current job, I am working from home, but will return to the office when we're allowed for 2-3 days per week. I live in the mid west, just in the last 6 weeks I've been getting emails and phone calls from recruiters for WFH jobs from companies on both coasts. The pay they're offering is 20%+ higher than I currently make, I have my reasons for staying put right now, but in a couple years if this trend keeps up I will have no choice but to take the higher paying job that I can maintain my current residence in Michigan.

Now while I probably won't be making Northern California salary, the salaries I am being offered exceed what firms in Michigan are paying for engineers in my industry. And what's more is my company recognizes what's going on and realize they are going to have to start paying more to retain their valuable employees.

[albacore]

14. One question...

Working from home requires a lotta bandwidth and a secure connection. Rural areas often don't have that.
Doesn't that limit movement? Everybody who wants to live in a rural area sometimes finds they don't fit for one reason or other. Broadband web access is another factor.

https://www.npr.org/2021/11/22/1037941547/life-without-reliable-broadband-internet-remains-a-daily-struggle-in-nevada

[Johnny2X2X]

15. Yeah, you need broadband

But that is expanding and there are a ton of areas with broadband to move to wherever you live.

[mnhtnbb]

19. Tech industries here in Research Triangle

are starting to reflect lower cost of living. They are adjusting salaries downward for people coming from Silicon Valley.

[Johnny2X2X]

21. Yeah, I don't expect to get Silicon valley money, but

So if my market is paying $100K a year, and Silicon Valley would pay me $180K a year for the same job if I lived there, a Silicon Valley company might offer me $150K to work remotely and call it a savings for them. That's kind of what I'm seeing in the head hunting right now, they'll pay me more than Michigan based companies will but not as much as if I lived in Boston, or Seattle etc etc.

By chance my next door neighbor worked for the same company I do here in MI, he's a young and extremely talented software whiz who's got a Masters in math and programs in a dozen languages. He recently left our company but still lives next to me working remotely for a company that does satellites in Colorado, said they almost doubled his pay. So I'm guessing he went from $75K a year (basically junior engineer pay for us) to $150K a year and he didn't have to move. I mean, how could he turn that down? His wife works for a Michigan based company and makes decent money too. So they now live in an upper middle class neighborhood in West Michigan and probably are pulling down $225K a year, they've just dramatically changed their circumstances and no doubt will be willing to pay a premium to upgrade their home within a couple years. So home prices in my cheaper area are going to keep rising due to things like this.

[mnhtnbb]

18. Zillow says my house is $170K MORE

than what I paid for it in less than 2 years, or about 35% appreciation in that time.

And yes, one of the things fueling the price increases here in Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill is the affordability for people coming from more expensive parts of the country. I have lots of new neighbors from California, New York, New Jersey, Washington, DC, as well as Ohio, Texas, Maryland, Arkansas...

The house my husband and I sold for $800,000. in 1988 when we left California, Zillow now says is worth more than $5 million!!!

[MineralMan]

20. Yes. Stuff happens. I bought my first house in California in 1974.

I paid $20,000 for it. It was a tiny little cottage in a town on the Central Coast, about three blocks from a bay. My then wife and I paid cash for it. We had been saving.

Thirty years later, we needed to move to Minnesota to help care for her ailing father. We sold that tiny cottage for $357,000. While I had done a lot of work on it, and made it a unique little house, that was a huge increase. At the time, though, it was one of the least expensive houses in that community. In 2022, it's valued at close to $700K.

We bought our new home in Minnesota for less than half of that selling price. 17 years later, we sold it and moved into a townhome. It was an even trade, pretty much, so any gain in value that MN house had accrued went directly to our new place.

Things go up and down in price. The key is to actually own your home. If you do, you will always be able to sell it and move, realizing any growth in value. If you buy in the same area, it should be about an even transaction, so nothing is lost, with costs mainly being moving costs.

Most people's homes are mortgaged to the hilt. Avoiding that is an excellent goal, if you can do it. Sadly, that is not how most homeowners think, though.

[Srkdqltr]

7. The problem is you have to pay more for another house.

So there really is no profit unless one moves to another area where houses are cheaper.

[MineralMan]

9. Not necessarily. People who downsize can often find a new place

that suits their current needs for considerably less than their current home is worth. My wife and I moved last year, and downsized from a typical home on a lot to a townhome that suits our current lifestyle better. It's a much nicer home, but cost the same as the one we bought to move to.

Moving to another lower-priced area, of course, offers even more opportunities to cash in on the equity in a home in an expensive area. Many people are in the process of doing that right now.

[albacore]

11. How about this one. In the Puget Sound country. 10 miles from the nearest small town.

[albacore]

12. Inside... check out the "Overview"..

[MissB]

13. A coworker sold a house recently.

It was nice, but small. Probably a bit smaller than the house listed in the OP, and certainly not on a big piece of property - 5000 sq ft lot. Much older home too. Listed in the mid-600s. They had 70 showings the weekend it was listed. They accepted an offer of over $100k more than asking.

It would've been considered a starter home back in the day.

[TxGuitar]

16. One down the street from us is listed at 369,500

Same exact floor plan- but ours has been updated. 1614 sf. Located in master planned community just west of Houston. The one for sale is on a cul de sac lot. Built in 2008; ours was built in 2009- we have more upgrades- all brick, front porch- updated kitchen a couple of weeks ago. We paid about 41% of that price! Glad ours is paid off!

[Jspur]

17. My family moved to Cary, NC back in '94 which is a suburb of Raleigh

and it's amazing to see how the prices have changed since then. When I moved here as a kid in '94 my parents didn't buy a house immediately since they were setting up their small business. We ended up renting a house that was identical in looks to the house that the OP posted but the color was yellow. My parents had goals of purchasing a McMansion, so they had no interest of buying the house from the landlord. I still remember the Landlord wanting to sell the house back then to them for 140K and my parents rejecting the offer and moving out of the house in '97. They would immediately purchase a McMansion which they still own today at 350K.

A lot of houses back during the 90's and even early to mid '00s used to go in the 150-180 range in the Raleigh area that were equivalent to the house that the OP posted.